The world’s most honest cities

Losing your wallet or purse while travelling is often a painstaking mistake. We keep so much of our lives in there: cash, plastic, drivers’ licence, ID cards. When all of those things go missing together, it can be a costly process to get them back. If you’re prone to losing your wallet, dropping things or leaving things behind, then Helsinki in Finland is the destination for you.

The Reader’s Digest “lost wallet” test measured how honest citizens were from 16 cities across the world by dropping 12 wallets in public spaces in each city, and seeing how many were returned. Among the least honest cities were Lisbon, Madrid and Prague. Starting with the least honest, here is the full run down:

With 11 wallets returned, Helsinki ranked as the most honest city of all. Lasse Luomakoski, a 27-year-old businessman, who found the wallet in downtown Helsinki said Finns are naturally honest: “We are a small, quiet, closely-knit community. We have little corruption, and we don’t even run red lights.”